Yes it is... the Canucks aren't bottom-feeders, but let's not kid ourselves about how good the team is. Luongo can't win 80 games on his own -- we saw that in Florida -- so we might want to temper expectations.

As I said in another thread, I think the Northwest is so even top to bottom that luck will be the biggest factor. When the season ends with about 8 points separating first from last, we -- as fans -- have to appreciate that that didn't mean that everything went right for the division winner, and everything went wrong for the fifth place team. There simply aren't that many gaps between them.

Funny what difference a year can make! While very over-rated last year the canicks are not being underrated this year.

The canucks underachieved last year and will have a drastically different look on the ice this coming season... but it is a stretch to say that our Stanley Cup contending Canucks from last season are being underrated this season. It is nice to see people being more realistic this season. For me a realistic expectation is to win a few more of the easy ones (ie. St Louis) , get a playoff berth better that 8th and make a run for it the way the Oilers did this year.

For me a realistic expectation is to win a few more of the easy ones (ie. St Louis) , get a playoff berth better that 8th and make a run for it the way the Oilers did this year.

I was going to make that point. With the Northwest being such a tight division, the Canucks MUST win games against the doormats of the other divisions. The Canucks were winless in four tries against St. Louis last year. That is unforgiveable. Even if the Canucks could have managed a split with the Blues, they would have made the playoffs.

What a useless post. What kind of asinine question is that? Clearly yes our underratedness IS being overrated!

All the other NHL teams know we are going to have trouble scoring goals this year and as a result they are going to come out and play a loose game not fearing our offense. Knowing this AV will have the boys flying in the first period leading to a multitude of goals in the first. So at first glance you would think that this is in our benefit.

However after the first week the opposition coaches will figure this out and start trapping early in the game leading to a lot of low scoring games. But since this fits our apparent "defense first" system we should win more than our fair share of these games.

However after the second week of the season the opposition coaches will have THAT figured out and will go back to the loosey goosey play leading to more goals and...oh hell I can't remember where I was going with this.

Wasn't this a conversation from an A-Team episode? The one where Murdock was trying to stratagize?

The truth of the matter is that the average canuck fan is going to overrate the team...such as expecting to score as many or more goals this year than last (256). For that to happen pretty much every player has to have a career year. It could happen but in all likelihood it won't..

On the other side of things, you have Flames, oiler and Avs fans who will predict the same players will only score 200 goals (only St. louis scored less than 200, chicago was the next lowest with 211). They will underate the canucks.

Believe me there is a thread at Calgarypuck making fun of canuck fans on hockeys future for predicting 265 goals from this club (would essentially be top 5 going by last years totals last year) while some flames fans are predicting that 200-210 mark. Which would be essentially last in the league based on last years totals.

In all likelihood the number will lie in between those two extremes. This will not be an offensive powerhouse team but I do think they will be in the middle of the pack slightly above or slightly below 15th.

So are "we" (i.e. the average canuck fan) overrating them...yeah probably. But others are underrating them. It's simply called being a fan and really at this stage everyone is tied for first place in the standings so why not be optimistic?

Offensively I think canuck fans are closer to the truth than other teams fans. This seems to me to be a deeper lineup (especially if Nonis can secure a top 6 RWer). Defensively I think those other folks may be closer to the truth. No doubt about it right now the canucks are doing a lot of finger crossing with Bieksa, Bourdon and Krajicek (we already know tremblay can't play defence). It is a weak blueline on paper at this moment in time. Of course one decent #5 worthy addition makes the blueline far better. And you never know Bourdon could surprise with a good 5/6 showing all year and Krajicek may continue his progress and become that top 4 guy. It's a lot of ifs and hit or miss right now for the blueline.

But of course the opposite holds true...flames fans are going to be overly optimistic at this time while other fans will underrate the team. It goes for any team.

Note I say "average fan". I think most on this board in particular are far from the average fan. Most can take the rose coloured glasses off and see the team for what it is. Give an honest assessment. Certainly not the case on most boards.

Excellent post, tant. We don't always agree regarding Auld and Cloutier, but I agree completely with you on this. Especially with the cap, teams are rarely able to have quality depth with proven talent, so the uncertainty is larger and fans are in a way more justified in overrating their own team and underrating the others. These days, winningl depends a bit more on luck. Injuries suddenly become very important, because rarely does a team have the depth to overcome injuries to key players. Teams have to rely on the young, and any two young players with also identical stats and attributes can perform very differently if called up to the NHL. Then there are those UFA signings. It made a huge difference that Anaheim got Selanne and New Jersey got Mogilny, even though both players are similar in age and both scored 76 goals in the same season.

tantalum wrote:The truth of the matter is that the average canuck fan is going to overrate the team...such as expecting to score as many or more goals this year than last (256). For that to happen pretty much every player has to have a career year. It could happen but in all likelihood it won't..

On the other side of things, you have Flames, oiler and Avs fans who will predict the same players will only score 200 goals (only St. louis scored less than 200, chicago was the next lowest with 211). They will underate the canucks.

Believe me there is a thread at Calgarypuck making fun of canuck fans on hockeys future for predicting 265 goals from this club (would essentially be top 5 going by last years totals last year) while some flames fans are predicting that 200-210 mark. Which would be essentially last in the league based on last years totals.

In all likelihood the number will lie in between those two extremes. This will not be an offensive powerhouse team but I do think they will be in the middle of the pack slightly above or slightly below 15th.

So are "we" (i.e. the average canuck fan) overrating them...yeah probably. But others are underrating them. It's simply called being a fan and really at this stage everyone is tied for first place in the standings so why not be optimistic?

Offensively I think canuck fans are closer to the truth than other teams fans. This seems to me to be a deeper lineup (especially if Nonis can secure a top 6 RWer). Defensively I think those other folks may be closer to the truth. No doubt about it right now the canucks are doing a lot of finger crossing with Bieksa, Bourdon and Krajicek (we already know tremblay can't play defence). It is a weak blueline on paper at this moment in time. Of course one decent #5 worthy addition makes the blueline far better. And you never know Bourdon could surprise with a good 5/6 showing all year and Krajicek may continue his progress and become that top 4 guy. It's a lot of ifs and hit or miss right now for the blueline.

But of course the opposite holds true...flames fans are going to be overly optimistic at this time while other fans will underrate the team. It goes for any team.

Note I say "average fan". I think most on this board in particular are far from the average fan. Most can take the rose coloured glasses off and see the team for what it is. Give an honest assessment. Certainly not the case on most boards.